Kendrapara: The construction of the state’s first geo-synthetic tube sea wall project to arrest sea erosion along the Pentha coast has been completed, bringing relief to the people living in vulnerable coastal villages in this district.
According to the project officials, mooted in 2008, the project had suffered a setback following rupture of one of the synthetic tubes. Experts had found loopholes in the installation process of the geo-synthetic tubes and the project work was suspended midway in July last year, they said.
Executive engineer of the saline embankment division of the project, Purna Chandra Rath said the project envisaged a 505-metre-long wall consisting of 241 geo-tubes.
The seawall project formed a part of the Integrated Coastal Zone Management Programme and was funded by the World Bank. The construction work was carried out under the technical expertise and guidance of IIT Chennai, he said. Orissa is the second state in the country to have undertaken such a project on a pilot basis after neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, the official said.
The project was mooted in 2008. Past studies indicated that more than 36 per cent of the coast in Kendrapara faced threat of erosion, the problem being most acute near habitations such as Pentha and Satabhaya in Rajnagar block. PNN
